Introduction
Have you ever stopped to think about the incredible power of your mind? From making conscious decisions to performing routine tasks automatically, the mind is a fascinating part of human nature. In this article, I’ll delve into the workings of the mind. Exploring the conscious and subconscious. Showing how habits and beliefs are formed. So, let’s start by defining what exactly is the mind.
What is the Mind?
Let’s start this discussion with a brief definition of the mind. The mind is not something you can point at physically. It is not the brain. Instead, the mind is a concept that can be used to discuss how humans think and behave. We can further divide the concept of the mind into two parts: the conscious and the subconscious mind.
Conscious mind
The conscious mind is part of the mind that you are using to read this article. Researchers estimate that the conscious mind is responsible for 5-10% of your daily thoughts. The conscious mind can be considered the rational thinking part of the mind. It makes decisions based on a thought process that you are aware of.
The easiest way to think about the conscious mind is that it is the “chatty” part of the mind. When you’re thinking and you’re having that internal debate with yourself on what to do, that internal debate is your conscious mind.
Here’s an example. You walk into a restaurant and look at the menu. On the menu, you see a salad and a steak. The steak looks delicious. The salad doesn’t quite appeal to you however, you’re trying to lose weight. Now you have to make a choice. The internal debate you’re having between choosing the delicious steak or the diet-friendly salad is done in your conscious mind. Anytime you’re having a conversation in your head, you’re using your conscious mind.
Now that you have a basic understanding of the conscious mind, let’s describe the subconscious mind.
Subconscious Mind
The subconscious mind represents the other 90-95% of our daily thoughts. However, these are thoughts that you’re not consciously aware of. So what’s up? Let me use a computer analogy to explain.
If you have a computer at home or work it probably has some type of anti-virus software. To be effective the anti-virus software needs to be continuously running in the background in order to protect your computer. The only time you’re aware of it running is when you browse a website and a message pops up telling your that the anti-virus has blocked malware. Otherwise, you go on your merry way surfing the net without a care in the world, completely unaware that you are being protected by the anti-virus.
The subconscious mind works in much the same way. It runs 24 hours a day, 365 days a year without a break. It monitors your environment keeping watch and recording everything that happens to and around you. When something changes in the environment the subconscious retrieves the appropriate program and executes it. At any given time, multiple programs run simultaneously in our subconscious mind.
You may ask, what are these programs that the subconscious runs? They can be broken down into two broad categories; habits and beliefs.
Habits
We’ll look at habits first. Think of all of the things you do without consciously thinking about them. Driving a car. Tying your shoe. Even something as simple as moving a fork to your mouth to eat. These are all habits. Habits are created to “automate” mundane tasks that we do every day.
The way we create a habit is through conscious repetition. Think back to when you first learned to drive a car. Each step of driving was a conscious thought. For example, you’re coming to a stop sign to make a right-hand turn. First, recognize the stop sign and its meaning. Next, put your foot on the brake, Put the turn signal on. Make sure you’re at a complete stop. Look left and right. Take your foot off the brake. Press on the gas pedal. Begin to turn the steering wheel. Whew, that’s a log of steps to remember each time you make a turn.
Fortunately, through reputation, the subconscious learns the steps and creates a program to execute all of the steps automatically without any conscious thought. Now you have a habit. All habits are formed in this way.
Beliefs.
Beliefs are a central aspect of human psychology. Beliefs shape the way we perceive and interpret the world around us. In psychology, beliefs are generally defined as mental representations of knowledge or information that an individual holds to be true.
So how are beliefs formed? Beliefs are formed by the information we pick up in our environment. An infant comes into this world free of all beliefs. The infant’s mind is like a sponge picking up all sorts of information that will help it survive and thrive in the world. Where does this information come from? Initially, it comes from the parents and close family members. As the child grows then additional information is received from teachers, religious figures, and other authority figures. One interesting characteristic of beliefs is that just like a habit they are formed and strengthened through repetition.
The following example of a young child attending school illustrates this. Like many young children starting school, our young student is struggling to learn how to read. Suppose she stumbles as she is reading aloud to the class. She looks at the teacher and sees a disapproving look. This may register in her subconscious as a new program entitled “Teacher doesn’t think I’m smart”. If it only happens once and then later on the teacher gives the student an approving look, then the fledgling belief fades into obscurity. On the other hand, what if the teacher repeatedly gives a disapproving look or disapproving words to the student Now the belief is reinforced through repetition. The more repetitions the more reinforcement and the stronger the belief becomes.
Almost every belief is created through a process of repetition. However, beliefs can also be created through a traumatic event. I have a friend who witnessed an airliner crash. In one brief instant a new, incredibly strong belief was created, the fear of flying. Prior to witnessing the crash she had no problem getting on an airplane.
Fortunately, most trauma-induced beliefs are not nearly so dramatic. A traumatic event is in the eye, or mind, of the beholder. What is traumatic to one person may not be to another.
Now that we’ve covered what a belief is and how it is formed, let’s take a look at three broad categories of beliefs. These categories are based on my experience working with clients. They may not be the same categories that you would find in a psychology textbook. I call these categories; internally focused beliefs, external beliefs, and interaction beliefs.
Internally Focused Beliefs
Internally focused beliefs are those beliefs you hold about who you are and what you are capable of. We commonly call these your self-image and self-esteem. One of these beliefs can be identified through the simple phrase “I am _____” or “I can _____”. Whatever fills in the blank is a belief about the person (I am) or about their abilities (I can).
If you want to identify your internally focused beliefs repeat the two phrases above, listing all of the words or phrases you use to fill in the blank. Sometimes it is easier to use the negative versions of “I am not _____” or “I can’t _____”. People seem to be better able to identify what they aren’t or can’t do instead of who they are and can do.
Externally Beliefs
The next category of beliefs is beliefs about the world external to you, your worldview. These can be beliefs about other individuals, ethnicities, socio-economic classes, or religions,, You get the idea.
External beliefs take a bit more work to identify because the initial response is not the actual belief. An example will illustrate this best. Suppose someone comes upon a panhandler on the street asking for money. The first reaction may be one of disgust. Disgust is not a belief but an emotion triggered by the belief. Asking “why” the individual feels disgusted reveals the belief that the panhandler is just plain lazy and doesn’t want to work. If you do this exercise you may have to repeat the “why” a number of times before you get to the root belief. Continuing the above example, you can ask the question “Why do I believe the panhandler is lazy”. This digs deeper and you come up with a new answer, “my religion says everyone must work for their food”. If you as why again and don’t come up with a new deeper answer then congratulations, you’ve identified the root external belief.
Interaction Beliefs
The final broad classification of beliefs is those beliefs that affect the interaction between yourself and the world. An example will best explain this. You have a belief that when you meet someone you should always be courteous to them no matter how they treat you. This is not an internally focused belief because it cannot be associated with “I am” or “I can”. It is not an external belief because it says nothing about the other individual. Instead, it only speaks to how you will interact with someone.
Building on what we now know about the subconscious mind, let’s discuss how the subconscious mind communicates. The subconscious is non-verbal so it must communicate through non-verbal means. The most common methods are emotions and feelings.
Emotions and Feelings
For this article, I will make a distinction between an emotion and a feeling. I’ll define an emotion as a state of mind such as happy, sad, angry, bored, or cheerful. Feelings are felt physically in the body; tension, anxiety, or fear are examples.
Emotions
Emotions are the result of executing a belief program. They are an effect, not a cause! Let’s say you’re on social media and you come across a cute picture of a puppy that makes you smile (happy) and say “ah so cute!” Pull back the covers and you find that you have a program something like “Puppies are lovable”. Tied to this program is an emotional response that creates a happy feeling. Each time the “Puppies are lovable” program executes it triggers a happy response.
Here the belief “puppies are lovable” creates an emotion that says, “give me more of that”. It’s the way the subconscious communicates its desire for more of a good thing.
Feelings
Like emotions, feelings are a response to the execution of a belief. As mentioned above, the difference is that it is felt in the body. Continuing with our puppy example, we find that every time the “puppies are lovable” program executes a relaxed warm feeling is created in the body and a smile comes on your face. These are physical effects created by the underlying belief. Again, the subconscious is signaling that it wants more puppy pictures.
In contrast, let’s look at another example of a feeling. Suppose that you are walking down the street after dark in a “rough” part of town. This triggers a “danger, be careful” belief. The belief triggers a nervous or anxious feeling in the body. This feeling alerts you to be aware of your surrounding and move to a safer place.
Ideomotor responses
Before leaving the discussion regarding how the subconscious communicates there is one other way that is used under certain circumstances. When a person is working with a hypnotist, the subconscious mind can communicate through what is called ideomotor responses. These are typically finger movements that the hypnotized person is not consciously aware of. This can provide yes and no answers to questions posed by the hypnotist. One finger for yes and another for no.
Conclusion
Here are the key takeaways from this article
- The mind is a concept that can be used to discuss how humans think and behave.
- The conscious mind is responsible for 5-10% of our daily thoughts and is the rational thinking part of the mind.
- The subconscious mind represents 90-95% of our daily thoughts, and these are thoughts that we’re not consciously aware of.
- Habits are created to automate mundane tasks that we do every day. They’re formed through conscious repetition and become automatic in the subconscious mind.
- Beliefs shape the way we perceive and interpret the world around us. They’re formed by the information we pick up in our environment.
- The subconscious mind communicates primarily through the use of emotions and physical feelings.
In the next article, I’ll discuss how this information can be used to change your life. Stay tuned.!